Iguazu Falls

Iguazu Falls (Cataratas del Iguazu)

“Poor Niagara!” – Eleanor Roosevelt exclaimed, barely glancing at the Iguazu Falls. This breathtaking spectacle of nature is located on the border of Brazil and Argentina.

The riot of natural elements struck the eye of more than one first lady: here, to Iguazu Falls, tourists from all over the world seek to visit.

Video: Iguazu Falls

General Information

In the language of the local Guarani tribe, who have inhabited the banks of the Iguazu River for centuries, the name means “Big Water” (u guaso). The river spreads here for 2.7 km and forms a cascade of 270 individual waterfalls at the edge of a fault 75 meters deep. This fault is called the Gargantadel Diablo (“Devil’s Mouth”). Local tribes have created many naive tales, legends and myths about the appearance of “Big Water”. The most poetic of these is the legend of the beautiful daughter of the chief, young Naipi. Here’s how it goes:

On the banks of the Iguazu River lived a beautiful daughter of a chief named Naipi. She fell in love with the bravest warrior in their tribe. But alas, she had already been promised to be given in marriage to the divine serpent M’bon. In despair, Naipi and her warrior got into a canoe and sailed down the river, which was then quiet and peaceful. But suddenly M’boi awoke to find that his bride had run away. In a rage he plunged as hard as he could into the river. From the force of the impact, the ground broke and the water rushed into a deep depression. M’boi turned the brave warrior into a cliff, to be forever beaten and whipped by the cruel water. And he turned the beautiful Naipi into a palm tree on the shore of the “Big Water.” When the wind blows in the evening, the palm tree may stretch out its arms-branches in longing toward her beloved, but it will never reach him.

Geologists, on the other hand, believe the fault was caused by tectonic shifts that took place 100,000 years ago. “Devil’s Mouth” was formed where the river bed collapsed, leaving a steep cliff from which cascades of water now flow.

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The Iguaçu River is about 1,320 kilometers long and is formed from the confluence of the Atuba and Iran rivers near the Brazilian city of Curitiba. For several miles it flows through the Brazilian province of Paraná, where it defines the border between Argentina and Brazil. This means that the waterfalls occupy the territory of both Brazil and Argentina: 800 meters of cascades belong to the former and 1900 meters to the latter. And although the closest you can get to the Devil’s Mouth is from the Argentine side, the most favorable view is from the Brazilian side. Up until recently, 7,000 cubic meters of water flowed over the edge of the Devil’s Mouth every second. However, a dam has now been built upstream at Salto de Caixa, reducing the volume of water by two-thirds. Despite being declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site back in 1986, the Iguazu Falls and surrounding areas are still threatened.

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Brazil’s Iguazu National Park is home to many rare and endangered birds and animals, and has five types of forests and ecosystems. On the Argentine side, visitors can follow a variety of hiking trails, some of which are literally on the edge of the precipice below the falls.

Facts

• Location: The Iguazu Falls are located on the border between Brazil and Argentina.
Dimensions: The rift is 2,700 meters wide, of which 800 meters are in Brazilian territory and 1,900 meters in Argentine territory.
• Water mass: The cliff is 75 meters high. Every second 7000 cubic meters of water fell from it until recently, when a dam was built upstream, reducing the volume of falling water by two-thirds. Now the amount of water in the river depends on the water level in the resulting Salto de Caixa Reservoir.
• Discovery: In 1,542, Spanish navigator Alvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca (1490-1557) became the first European to see the waterfalls.
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• UNESCO World Heritage List: the Iguazu Falls and two national parks on both banks of the river were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1986
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How to get there

There are regular flights to Foz to Iguaçu from Rio de Janeiro, as well as other Brazilian cities, and daily flights from Buenos Aires to Puerto Iguaçu, or you can walk across the Friendship Bridge from the city of Ciudad del Este on the Paraguayan side.